Good Tiger – ‘We Will All Be Gone’ (Album Review)

Having crowdfunded $46,000 in support of their first album A Head Full Of Moonlight, Good Tiger made a massive impact on the global rock and metal scene even before that auspicious debut hit digital shelves, speakers, and eardrums.

Fair play.

This time out, the progressively-oriented super-supergroup are back withWe Will All Be Gone, continuing their creative streak and ripping through some extremely tasty and tasteful bangers as they do so. Since the sessions for Good Tiger’s latest were overseen by über-producer Forrester Savell and mixed and engineered by Adam “Nolly” Getgood of Periphery, We Will All Be Gone naturally sounds flawless. It’s neither clinically soulless nor amateurish and out of control; everything is in its right place, positioned and toned for maximum effectiveness.

Songwriting-wise, Good Tiger have already established themselves as more than professionals. Stylistically, elements of each member’s former/associated band (The Safety Fire, Tesseract, The Faceless, Architects) make themselves known at various points, but the Good Tiger sound as a whole remains resolutely unique. The bulk of We Will All Be Gone is dedicated to Good Tiger’s newly refined taste for driving alt-rock punctuated by massive chorus hooks, filthy riffs, and vocals that bring to mind both Cedric Bixler-Zavala and Rody Walker. Meanwhile, understated progressive tendencies consistently lurk beneath the surface.

The real highlights, however, come right at the end.

Although Nineteen Grams may start off sounding relatively predictable, when its core riff kicks in, you’ll break some bones if you try to stay still. That track is this album’s ultimate highlight – but straight after that, we get Cherry Lemon, a sick drum solo set to some Incubus-flavoured, lightly overdriven guitar parts, and final cut I’ll Finish This Book Later. At this point, Good Tiger shift gears three more times – once into clean, spacious guitars and intimate vocals, again into apocalyptic chordal hammer blows, and eventually back to a brief clean-guitar-and-vocal reprise.

Then, the end.

Overall, We Will All Be Gone shows how much Good Tiger have already matured – but more than that, it’s reinforced their enduring willingness to stretch themselves beyond the classic rock-song format. Personally, I’d love to hear still more variety in the vein of this album’s closing few songs when Good Tiger get around to writing and recording Album Three. Still, when Good Tiger rock, they do so righteously – and they’ve once again given their all here.

LTK RATING: 90%

We Will All Be Gone drops February 9, and can be pre-ordered on iTunes here.